Uber's president Jeff Jones quits amid company turmoil

Uber's president of ridesharing, Jeff Jones, is leaving the
company after less than a year on the job. Recode
first reported the shake-up on Sunday, and Uber has
since confirmed the departure with Business Insider.

"We want to thank Jeff for his six months at the company and wish
him all the best," the company said in a statement.

Jones' departure is not a direct result of the company's search
for a new COO, one that could've outranked him, but because Uber
was "not the situation he signed on for,"
according to Recode.

In an internal email obtained by Business Insider, though, Uber
CEO Travis Kalanick told employees that Jones "came to
the tough decision that he doesn't see his future at Uber" after
the company announced its intention to hire a new
second-in-command.

Since the beginning of the year, Uber has been hit
with a blistering few weeks of bad press. In January, over
200,000 customers deleted Uber in one weekend as part of the
#DeleteUber movement. Since then, the company has had to launch
an internal investigation into its workplace culture after a
former engineer published a tell-all blog post about the gender
bias and sexual harassment she allegedly endured at the company.

Uber has also been sued by its investor, Google, for
allegedly using stolen technology and had details of a program
designed to deceive government authorities published in the
last two weeks.

According to Recode, Jones departure is "directly" related to the
number of scandals at the company. In a statement sent to Recode,
Jones said he was leaving because "the beliefs and approach to
leadership that have guided [his] career are inconsistent with
what [he] saw and experienced at Uber."

Kalanick pledged to find leadership help and hire a new No. 2 as
the result of the scandals, although many speculated that Jones'
initial role at the company was to be that right-hand man.

When the company announced his hire in August, Kalanick lauded
the former Target exec's experience as CMO and was excited about
what he would bring to the ride-hailing giant.

Jones' role as president meant he was in charge of all of
Uber's operations, marketing, and customer support around the
globe — a position that unseated Uber's first CEO Ryan
Graves.

Yet, Jones had a rough few months on the job, including a
disastrous Q&A with drivers that did little more than stoke
the flames of ire directed toward the company.

The internal email says that Jones' operations will report
to Kalanick in the interim. Jones' exit was also described as
sudden and a surprise to the company, according to a source
familiar with the matter.

His departure is the latest in a string of high profile
leadership departures. Uber's head of AI, Gary Marcus, left to
become a special advisor to the company in March. Former
Twitter engineer Raffi Krikorian
stepped down from his role as a senior director of engineer
at Uber's Advanced Technologies Center in late February. Another
key member of Uber's self-driving team, Charlie Miller,
had left Uber to join Chinese rival Didi's self-driving
car lab.

Uber's also had two executives resign as the
company investigates sexual harassment and gender bias in
its workplace. Amit Singhal was
asked to resign as SVP of engineering by CEO Travis Kalanick
after it was revealed he didn't inform Uber about previous
allegations of sexual assault. Uber's VP of Product and Growth Ed
Baker also
resigned under mysterious circumstances.

Here's Kalanick's internal email in full:

Team,

I wanted to let you know that Jeff Jones has decided to resign
from Uber.

Jeff joined Uber in October 2016 from being CMO at retailer
Target. In 6 months, he made an important impact on the
company—from his focus on being driver obsessed to delivering
our first brand reputation study, which will help set our
course in the coming months and year.

After we announced our intention to hire a COO, Jeff came to
the tough decision that he doesn’t see his future at Uber. It
is unfortunate that this was announced through the press but I
thought it was important to send all of you an email before
providing comment publicly.

Rachel, Pierre and Mac will continue to lead the Global Ops
teams, reporting to me until we have signed a COO. Troy
Stevenson, who leads CommOps, and Shalin Amin who leads brand
design will report to Rachel Holt. Ab Gupta will report to
Andrew MacDonald.